Summer. Last summer was super hard for me as I worked through some confusion about how to deal with the reality of having kids who were always gone. This year I haven't felt nearly as blindsided and am trying (and succeeding!) to really enjoy the freedom to spend these beautiful long days on my own. Some days (like yesterday) that means taking three walks and a lot of reading on my back deck. I'm not complaining...

Asia turned 49 on Sunday. Friends - that is one year from 50. What??? He's the best almost-50 year old I know... full of life and laughter and vigor. I'm planning a bang-up party for his 50th birthday. I really want to celebrate him. Can't wait.

Kyler is living life pretty independently these days - he's been out of the house since March... paying his own bills (mostly) and plugging away at his degree. He has two jobs right now - with a potential management opportunity coming up at one of them. There are little slip-ups along the way as he figures out budgeting and what-not... but I love the freedom of allowing him those learning opportunities. Parenting adults is not always easy, for it's own set of reasons, but there's a certain degree of satisfaction in saying "I did my part..." and then trusting God to take over from here. I pray. A lot. I believe it's the most effective thing I can do for him at this stage. I'm enjoying the challenge of loving him right where he's at and not over-parenting him... I want to be a trusted advisor and ally and friend... and not so much a lecturing know-it-all mom. I bite my tongue a lot when we're together and ask a lot of questions to try to encourage him to come up with his own answers. There is a new challenge in that and I'm enjoying the process as he figures life out.

Savannah is off at Ghormley Meadow again this year... she got three weeks off from her job at Spokane Therapist and is passing her days overseeing archery and paintball and whatever... and water skiing and hiking on her days off. It was the highlight of her summer last year... I'm praying for another amazing three weeks of growth and fun for her. She's pretty stinking responsible all the time and I love that she gets to let her hair down for three weeks and have fun.

Ethan just got back from a week at Cougar Strings Camp... an orchestra camp at WSU Pullman. Later this summer he has another camp in town with the Spokane Youth Symphony... and he has the distinction of being the only bass player at church all summer long so he's got LOTS of bass playing on the agenda. He gets better all the time and I LOVE watching and listening to him play. I'm so excited for this school year and his involvement in the Chamber Orchestra at Lewis and Clark. It's so fun to have another musician in the family.

Robins. Our back deck robins are back after their first brood met with tragedy in the form of a predatory neighborhood cat. We have a second batch of eggs that just hatched and I've secured (MacGyver'd) their nest so no cat can knock it off the wall this time around. Hoping they'll be starting to fly before we leave for Sierra Leone so I can watch that magical process. Their ugly little pink bodies are so sweet and vulnerable...

Ebola. This nasty little sickness has spread to the eastern region of Sierra Leone and we're watching it like crazy. At this point there is little concern that it could get to where we are going... but if you're the praying sort, you could sure keep that on your list of ways to pray for our upcoming trip. It's a pretty nasty disease that kills about a third of it's victims and we'd like to avoid it, for sure. But the bigger picture is that it has the potential to become an epidemic in a country where people are suspicious of doctors and have very little access to sanitary, reliable health care. That's our biggest concern...

I've been in a weird place with my weight-loss journey lately and have essentially been rebelling against the fact that I have to be so careful with food to succeed at maintenance. Which, by the way, never ends well. I was about ten pounds over my 'ideal' weight at one point and have had to really buckle down and apply what I know. Sometimes it just makes me really cranky that I can't eat whatever I want. But my reality is just that - in order to walk around in a healthy body, I have to work at making healthy choices all the time. If I try to make up my own version of what I know works it always catches up with me. And so I surrender again. Much like an alcoholic, I have to own my behavior, ask for help, have some accountability, and apply what I know is a proven method of managing my addiction. Dang it. But no - I'm thankful for the tools I have... and I'm thankful for the ongoing struggle... because it means my head is in the game and I'm not giving up. I was down 2 pounds at a weigh-in yesterday. 8 more to go. I WILL do it.